cannot emulate middle mouse button click in Ubuntu guest OS

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vb_user_6128
Posts: 21
Joined: 15. Jan 2018, 23:54

cannot emulate middle mouse button click in Ubuntu guest OS

Post by vb_user_6128 »

I am running the following configuration on a Dell XPS 13 9360:

Host OS: Windows 10 Pro
Guest OS: Ubuntu 16.04.2
VirtualBox 5.1.30 r118389 (Qt5.6.2)

I am not able to emulate a middle mouse button click inside of the guest OS when using the touchpad on the XPS 9360. Left/right clicks work fine. I have done a lot of searching on this issue and all of the discussions I could find involve removing Ubuntu's default synaptics drivers, installing libinput drivers, and properly configuring the appropriate libinput.conf file. The steps I followed were taken from various sources online:

1. uninstall default Ubuntu synaptics driver
2. install libinput driver
3. add "Option "Tapping" "True"" to libinput config file

The only catch is that all of the sources I could find referred to Ubuntu installed directly onto an XPS 13 9360, not installed as a guest OS in VirtualBox. For this reason I believe the issue lies with VirtualBox.

I have tried setting System->Motherboard->Pointing Device to each of the 3 possible settings, yet none allow me to emulate a middle mouse button click inside of Ubuntu.

Does anyone know what would be preventing me from emulating a middle mouse button click in the Ubuntu guest OS? Based on what I've read, the default behavior for the libinput drivers is for a 3-finger tap to be interpreted as a middle click. Does VirtualBox even recognize 3-finger taps? They work fine in the Host OS. I also tried remapping the middle mouse button to a 2-finger tap via the libinput config file's TappingButtonMap option, but that didn't change anything either.
socratis
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Posts: 27330
Joined: 22. Oct 2010, 11:03
Primary OS: Mac OS X other
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Win(*>98), Linux*, OSX>10.5
Location: Greece

Re: cannot emulate middle mouse button click in Ubuntu guest OS

Post by socratis »

VirtualBox does *not* see your Synaptics pad, there's absolutely no point in installing a Synaptics driver in your guest. The only thing it sees, is a generic mouse/tablet. And as far as I know, tablets do not offer a middle-button. And you don't have a physical middle-button that you can pass-through to the guest, you have a "software emulated" one. That may be your problem. Have you tried connecting a mouse that has a middle-button? Tell me if it works in that case...
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vb_user_6128
Posts: 21
Joined: 15. Jan 2018, 23:54

Re: cannot emulate middle mouse button click in Ubuntu guest OS

Post by vb_user_6128 »

I connected a 3-button mouse to my laptop and the middle mouse button worked fine in the guest OS. I am also able to change my precision touchpad settings to remap the actions assigned to various taps and gestures. One of the possible actions is "middle click", but it is assigned to a 3-finger tap with no apparent way to remap it to a 2-finger tap/click. Does this mean there is no way to have middle click functionality inside the guest OS since it will only recognize a touchpad as a standard mouse and can't interpret the more complex taps/gestures that work in the host Windows 10 OS? My prior laptop with a non-precision touchpad (i.e. two discrete buttons plus a touchpad) had an option to map a simultaneous left/right click to a middle click, but I'm not seeing that anywhere here.
Last edited by socratis on 17. Jan 2018, 22:51, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Removed unnecessary verbatim quote of the whole previous message.
socratis
Site Moderator
Posts: 27330
Joined: 22. Oct 2010, 11:03
Primary OS: Mac OS X other
VBox Version: PUEL
Guest OSses: Win(*>98), Linux*, OSX>10.5
Location: Greece

Re: cannot emulate middle mouse button click in Ubuntu guest OS

Post by socratis »

vb_user_6128 wrote: My prior laptop with a non-precision touchpad (i.e. two discrete buttons plus a touchpad) had an option to map a simultaneous left/right click to a middle click, but I'm not seeing that anywhere here.
I can't help you with that, I don't have your current or your previous laptop. There may be software out there that enables that functionality for your trackpad, I have no clue...

You're lucky. I have an Apple, we just got the right-click functionality, it used to be simple click only... ;)
Do NOT send me Personal Messages (PMs) for troubleshooting, they are simply deleted.
Do NOT reply with the "QUOTE" button, please use the "POST REPLY", at the bottom of the form.
If you obfuscate any information requested, I will obfuscate my response. These are virtual UUIDs, not real ones.
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